Snowbirds capture third State archery title in a row

April 01, 2011|By Jeremy Speer Sports Editor

HT - Jeremy Speer

GAYLORD — It never gets old, but it’s certainly starting to get familiar.

The St. Mary archery team won its third-straight National Archery in the Schools Program State championship, shooting an impressive score of 3,415. That score was accumulated earlier in March at St. Mary’s home gymnasium. The state championship has been going on for just five years, and the Snowbirds have already captured three titles.

“It was a perfect time for us to shoot for the State Finals,” said St. Mary coach Mike Lawnichak. “Since then, we’ve been a little bit sluggish. But we’ve given the kids a little bit of time off and they’re starting to shoot a lot better.”

The Snowbirds will have a chance to iron out their kinks as it’s still more than a month a way to the National tournament, which will take place May 13-14 at Louisville, Ky.

St. Mary turned in a number of outstanding individual performances. On the girls side, Chrissy Smith was third in the state with a score of 290, Caylee Lawnichak was fifth with a score of 289 and Ellyn Milan was sixth, also with 289. Milan and Lawnichak had a shoot-off for the fifth-place position.

For the boys, Nick Lochinski placed fifth with a score of 289, while Justin Klee took sixth, also with 289.

Coach Lawnichak has been very impressed with the depth of his squad.

“Any of 24 shooters can finish in the top 24,” he said. “We have a ton of depth.”

This can be shown through the team’s performance in its other two tournaments this season. In the first one, Lochinski was first, Josh Dobrzelewski second and Dylan Masko third for the boys, while Lawnichak was second for the girls. In the second tournament, it was Stephanie LaRouche who took first overall.

The Snowbirds placed 12th in the nation in 2010 and 15th in 2009. A top 10 finish has been on the mind of Lawnichak since the last arrow was shot last season.

“We had a bad day last year at Nationals, and we know it,” he said. “We got distracted mentally.”

Lawnichak has made a giant effort to improve this portion of the team, bringing in Olympic athletes and coaches to work on getting a mental edge.

“If we don’t do anything at Nationals, we won’t get mentally distracted,” Lawnichak said.

The setting is much different there than it is at the cozy St. Mary gymnasium. Hundreds of shooters are firing arrows at a time in Kentucky. A case and point is that St. Mary’s state-title score of 3,415 would be the best in the history of the national tournament. Trying to replicate that in a tough setting will be the challenge.

The team has arranged to get a hotel room in Kentucky where it can practice indoors prior to the National tournament. This should help get St. Mary honed in for success.

“We’ve done our homework big-time to give our kids an advantage.”

Assisting Lawnichak with the team are John Masko, Mark Copeland and Nicole Blanzy. Lawnichak wanted to thank donors who helped the team purchase equipment this season and a new bow rack that was built. And for the past three seasons, the Safari International Club of Brighton has donated $500 to St. Mary’s program for finishing in top three in the State.